Great Expectations

By

Stanley W. Angrist

Updated Jan. 22, 1998 12:01 a.m. ET

Predicting the future is difficult, and I predict it will always be so. Mark Twain once remarked: "October is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February."

If you believe that experts can forecast events, you will have your faith shaken by William A. Sherden's "The Fortune Sellers " (Wiley, 308 pages, $29.95). He argues that no one can reliably make predictions in any field--and...